Katie,

I have been told by patients that they were told to try and keep their head elevated when they slept to decrease some of the drainage. I know this can be hard to do. One suggestion I thought that was quite interesting was putting phone books or pieces of 2x4 wood under the legs at the head of the bed.

As for covering the pillows and top of the bed to protect the mattress: you can always wrap the pillows in garbage bags and put your old pillowcases over them, for the mattress you can buy a roll of 4 mm poly vapour barrier from any hardware store and put this under your fitted sheet or purchase a plastic mattress protector to put under your fitted sheet and use your oldest sheets or buy some cheap ones that you can dispose of when they are no longer needed.

I hope this helps a little.

Cheers,

Mike